Seahawks still establishing new offensive identity

Share this:

Seahawks tight end John Carlson is brought down by Broncos safety Brian Dawkins last Sunday. (Justin Edmonds/Getty Images)

If you’re trying to figure out the Seahawks’ new offensive personality, don’t worry. You’re not alone.

The Seahawks themselves are still figuring out what they do best offensively under new coordinator Jeremy Bates, which make things interesting for their own players and presumably very difficult at this point for opposing defenses.

Jeremy Bates

In Week One, for instance, the Seahawks kept four tight ends active and had three of them pn the field for two different touchdown plays — a TD pass to Deion Branch and a 1-yard run by Matt Hasselbeck. They were very limited in three- and four-receiver sets in that game, leaning more toward multiple tight-end formations, as outlined in Brian McIntyre’s breakdown of personnel groupings.

But in Game Two, the Seahawks only activated two tight ends on game day and used just a single tight end on 50 of their 56 offensive snaps. Instead, they went with three-receiver sets on 34 plays compared to just 12 a week earlier.

What comes this week against San Diego remains to be seen.

“I think that’s probably what you’re going to see from us,” Hasselbeck said Wednesday. “We’re going to be somewhat new every week. In part because of injury, but also just because I think that’s how we want to do it.

“I think we’ll be a team that’s hard to prepare for. We could come out five wides, we could come out three tight ends. It’s early for me, too, but that’s the sense I get right now.”

Matt Hasselbeck

Hasselbeck acknowledged that’s a challenge from a preparation standpoint.

“It does make it difficult,” he said, “but I’m sure it makes it much more difficult for our opponent.”

Tight end John Carlson, who leads the team with eight receptions for 84 yards, said the offense is still discovering what it does best.

“I think we have enough weapons where we can be versatile, depending on what defense we’re facing that week,” Carlson said. “And also we’re still early in this phase of getting to know each other as players and coaches. Because of that, I don’t think we have a set identity yet, which is kind of fun. We come out and do different things, different weeks, and get a lot of people involved.”

Carlson, of course, is a fan of the multiple tight-end formations. He said Charlie Weis ran some three tight-end packages at Notre Dame, but that’s the last time he’s been part of that.

“As a tight end, we love to see tight ends on the field,” Carlson said with a laugh.

But it’s more than just job security for Carlson, veteran Chris Baker and young Cameron Morrah and Anthony McCoy. Morrah and McCoy were inactive last week, but both are athletic enough to offer unique aspects to the offense as well.

John Carlson

“I think when you look at our tight-end group, we have guys who can do multiple things,” Carlson said. “So they can line us up wide or put us in the backfield or on the line of scrimmage and I think it’s challenging for a defense to face a personnel group like that. They don’t know if we’ll be in a goal-line type set or if we’re going to spread it out.”

Carlson has received increasing opportunities to flank out wide, something that rarely happened last year when he was often needed to help block. Additionally, coach Mike Holmgren and last year’s coordinator, Greg Knapp, usually preferred extra wide receivers as opposed to multiple tight ends in passing formations.

“I do enjoy that,” Carlson said. “It’s something I haven’t done a great deal of, so I’m still learning and trying to get better at some of that stuff. But it is fun for me to be out in space and pretend to be a wide receiver every now and then.”

As for the guy running the show? Bates is pretty tight-lipped about his specific personnel philosophies, saying the coaching staff’s job each week is to figure out how to attack the opposing defense.

“We’re just trying to go into a game and get some first downs and score some points,” he said . “It’s going to be based on week-to-week.”